Most Scrutinized Political Haircut

October 19, 2016

For as long as he’s been on the City Council, Jumaane Williams, who represents East Flatbush, Flatbush, and Midwood, has been associated with his shoulder-length dreadlocks. “It’s cultural and spiritual,” Williams told going-natural.com in 2014. “I made a conscious decision as I was entering the work world to not change…I’m just very proud of my culture, whether it’s from Africa, from the Caribbean. I’m also a very big hip-hop head, a hip-hop fan, and I’m very proud of being a black American. And my hair is something I’m also very proud of.” So when Williams returned to the council chambers this spring from a brief absence for hernia surgery with his locks shorn, the City Hall gossip hothouse churned with curiosity: What did this momentous shift signify? Had Williams sold out? Was he, as NY1’s Dean Meminger asked him, perhaps contemplating a run for mayor? Nothing of the sort, insisted Williams. “If I was going to push for higher office, I would have loved to do it with the locks,” he said. Turns out there was an even higher consideration: “I had some thinning going on here, so that was a little rough.”